Clairity Click-it: Year-End Nonprofit Links and Free Resources

I’ve collected bountiful gifts for you to help you succeed in this most generous of seasons – and beyond!

As you may know, I’m dedicated to sending these curated resources on a bimonthly basis to share with you the best information out there. As others helped me, so do I wish to help you.

Of course, if you’ve not done so already, I hope you’ll alsoenroll this year for all the benefits ‘Clairification School’ has to offer. You’ll get access to all my content for a full 12 months, including original weekly articles, bonus webinars and more, in the most cost-effective way I’ve found to deliver it. Literally, it’s about a quarter a day. Your support makes it possible and, truly, means a lot.

P.P.S.Please send a shout-out to my Click-it sponsor, Bloomerang, who are doing more than their fair share in helping me bring this resource to you. I put a lot of work into curating and sending it to you, and it’s just me here. I’m not a large corporation. Since I can’t afford to lose money, they’re underwriting my time and helping me help YOU. Just click here to let them know they’re awesome!

Click-it: December fundraising do’s and don’ts. You still have time to put some of these strategies from Ronald Pruitt of 4aGoodCause in place. And even if you don’t do it this year, check them out and put them away for your next campaign.

Click-it: 3 Tools Power Ambassadors to Year-End Wins. Here are some great last-minute strategies to make it easier for your donors and volunteers to help spread the word. All from Nancy Schwartz at Getting Attention.

Content Marketing

Click-it: Photos to Fire Up Year-End & Protect Privacy. This is an excellent piece – with concrete advice — by Nancy Schwartz of Getting Attention on what to do if you can’t share real client photos or stories due to confidentiality concerns.

Major and Legacy Giving

NOTE: I’m offering quite a few resources on major gift fundraising this month, as I’m a firm believer every nonprofit (regardless of size or cause) should actively pursue major gifts from individuals. Please take this opportunity to check out my most popular e-Course: Winning Major Gift Strategies for the small and medium-sized shop. It begins January 22nd, goes for 8 weeks, and is on ‘early bird’ sale now until December 29th. You know this is the most cost-effective way to raise funds, right? Think about it!

Click-it: The Major Donor Right in Front of You. Richard Perry and Jeff Schreifels of Veritus Group offer an amazingly simple idea to find major donor prospects among your current volunteers.

Click-it: 7 Simple Steps to Qualify Your Donors. Before you decide which donors to cultivate you need to qualify them. Because not every major donor prospect will want to be cultivated! Get some tips from Greg Warner of Market Smart.

Click-it: The 3 Things Your Donors Really Want. This is a reflective piece by Nathan Stelter about the reciprocal nature of giving and receiving – especially if you hope to attract and retain passionate major donors. There are some great ideas for reshaping the way you approach your work.

Management and Strategy

Click-it: 5 Tips to Kill Stupid Ideas and Still Keep Your Job. This basic advice from Roger Craver on The Agitator/Donor Voice blog will stand you in good stead throughout your career. Lead from facts, evidence, research and experience, not from heresy or gut.

Mission Statements

Click-it: 10 Killer Nonprofit Mission Statements to Learn From. Sadly, most nonprofit mission statements miss the mark. Often, it’s hard to tell one from another. This article on the Classy blog offers some examples of missions that matter – because they’re written to be specific and answer a reader’s who, what, when, where and how questions.

Online Fundraising

Click-it: How to Create a Successful Fundraising Email. I’ve got 25 tips for you over on the Bloomerang blog, plus a sure-fire 7-step formula to assure your email does its job. Just sending something is not sufficient. Even if it’s too late to put all this info to use this year, tuck this away to study and use throughout the coming year.

FREE AUDIO-VISUAL LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES

Finding webinars you’d like to attend that overlap? Note that for many of these webinars you can obtain a copy of the recording if you’re unable to join live – as long as you register!

Grants

Click-it: What Donors Want [Listen to free podcast]. Want to get your proposal to the top of the pile? Check out this interview with Adam Askew from Comic Relief (sponsored by I.G. Advisors)about a grant making organization’s perspective on grant seekers, and what makes some stand out from the crowd. I’ll give you a hint: They want to be both inspired and reassured.

Major and Legacy Gifts

Click-it: 9 Useful Proven Strategies to Get the Major Donor Visit [REGISTER for my free webinar 1-8-19]. Major gifts from individuals represent the single greatest potential source of revenue growth for non-profits – by far — for the next decade.That’s true for nonprofits of any size or shape! But you won’t get far unless you meet with folks face-to-face. The key to success is getting the visit! Learn how in this session I’m offering in partnership with the great folks at Market Smart and The Fundraising Report Card.

Management and Strategy

Click-it: How Dashboards Can Help Your Nonprofit Achieve Its Goals [Download free webinar]. Nonprofit Quarterly presents Hilda Polanco leading a guided tour through the land of nonprofit dashboards. She offers real-life examples of the way these tailored tools are designed to portray key indicators and help in the creation of common language around goals, an integrated strategy, and course correction.

Donor Management

Click-it: Understanding the Costs of Charitable Giving [Download free white paper]. While looking into donation processors for a client, I came across this interesting article prepared by PayPal about the costs associated with different forms of giving (e.g., check, credit card and digital wallet). What works for the charity might be different than what works for donors. What works for younger donors might be different than what works for older ones. And so forth. I found it fascinating, and thought you might too.

If you find value in Clairification, your support via enrollment in Clairification School is a blessing. I promise to pay it back, and continue to offer lots of specific advice to help you raise greater awareness, more volunteerism and passionate philanthropy.

Engaging your help was such a huge pivot moment for me and the Board. We would never – not in a million years – have even dreamed of doing a significant challenge at our event without all of the teaching, support, resources and guidance that you brought to us. Sometimes there are these moments in life that you only realize in retrospect were miracles – and that is exactly how I look back at that decision to work with you on our fundraising engine!

Claire Axelrad has been a highly effective fundraiser for over 30 years and her blog is just a wealth of wisdom. What’s particularly notable about Clairification is that although the work is based on decades of past experience, Claire is always looking forward as well. She was the first among her veteran fundraising peers to embrace online and social fundraising and is now one of their most sensible and insightful proponents. She’s a great resource!

You have been absolutely terrific to work with. Your roadmap and assessment of where we are and where we can go has been so instrumental in having the board stop and think about our future. Your audit is allowing us to move forward in tangible ways to improve our work so that we may help more clients in need of our services. I will count you among my many blessings throughout the year.

I’m subscribed to a million fundraising blogs and the one I consistently open and read most of, is yours. The content is always carefully curated and helpful, not just sales pitch after sales pitch for your own stuff. You stand out, in a good way.

You are one of the few fundraising experts that I read faithfully, and we have no shortage of those who publish regularly. But your material is always thoughtful and realistic. Thank you for your candor and good advice.

I read your newsletter all the time and find your advice “spot on” and always usable. I pass it on consistently to the staff and other board members. I really appreciate all you do to help nonprofits. Thanks.

You remind me about what is most important and why I love this profession. I just discovered you and your blog about three weeks ago and I wanted to write today to say thank you for sharing your wisdom and expertise. I find your posts, new and old, so spot on. You nail it.

Everybody involved in philanthropy should read these articles slowly and with a very opened mind and a willingness to take from them the necessary components to change the manner and techniques we presently use in order to embrace what philanthropy is all about “Love”. I have no doubt it would be transformational.

I came across your website and I hit the goldmine! I was asked to join a board and found I need to understand how to build a donor base from the ground up. I searched, only to find expensive consultants or free info that didn’t offer any helpful information. Thank you for sharing so much valuable information!!

Wow! Inspiration out the wazoo! Many thanks — I keep up with trends and lots of blog-posts to stay on top of my game. This goes way beyond technique and reaches deep inside to remind me why I’ve done this work for 40 years!

Thank you for your brilliant blog. I have been a follower for many years and learnt so much from you. Ultimately, it translates into many more families getting the support they deserve. You help me raise more money for my UK charity. Please never stop bringing the best out of me! You’re special.

Exactly what our profession can use – clarification –- the title of your blog. You help us keep faith with the past while making sense of the present and future. You have a balanced and respectful understanding of what this is all about. Thanks.

I’d recommend you sign up. I signed up for about a dozen blogging fundraiser consultants, but have since canceled most. She’s one of two left standing. I like how she organizes her thoughts about fundraising, and her conversation planning techniques are very familiar to me from my work as a prosecutor. I believe that she was a practicing attorney and who changed careers like I have, and my best guess is that she was a litigator as well. This is a very good article and there are several other blogs (her own) that she links to within it, so even though this is a small article you could spend some time here.

Created by fundraisers for fundraisers, Bloomerang makes it easy for nonprofits of all shapes and sizes to build and manage donor relationships key to long-term success. -Claire

When Claire speaks, we listen. There are few consultants in the nonprofit sector who so closely align with Bloomerang's focus on donor stewardship and retention. The Clairification School provides too much value to ignore!

Check out their state-of-the-art marketing solutions and technology focused on major and legacy gift qualification and cultivation.-Claire

There are plenty of resources online, but you know the old adage, "you get what you pay for." Skip the "same old" blog posts, and head to Clairification School to get relevant, timely, and most importantly effective resources today.

Firespring offers beautiful websites with an integrated marketing, software and fundraising suite—all you need to make life easier for you and your supporters.-Claire

Claire’s fresh perspective and unwavering approach to instill new ideas, techniques and proven practices are but a few reasons why Clarification School is a tremendous resource.

Clairification School offers a wealth of information and knowledge; Claire communicates so clearly and simply that even brand-new concepts are easy to grasp and put into practice.

Helping nonprofits raise more money online for more than 20 years through one of the easiest-to-use and most affordable fundraising platforms available.-Claire

Claire Axelrad is one of the smartest philanthropy coaches we know. Take advantage of her expertise by enrolling in the Clairification School. You'll gain a wealth of knowledge to take your fundraising to the next level.